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JAPAN
Mar 17, 1999

FRC gives banking license to HLAC

The Financial Reconstruction Commission on Wednesday gave a banking license to the Housing Loan Administration Corp. so that it can expand operations to recover bad loans in the banking sector.
LIFE / Travel / NATURE TRAVEL
Mar 17, 1999

The hills are alive with wild fungal growths

The Field Studies Council (FSC) is a British not-for-profit organization that has as its slogan: "Environmental understanding for all!"
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 17, 1999

Sacred road maps to paradise

JAPANESE MANDALAS: Representations of Sacred Geography by Elizabeth ten Grotenhuis. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 1999. Pp. 228; color plates 22; b/w illustrations, 104. $52.00 (cloth); $29.95 (paper). The mandala has been defined (by Toga no Shozui) as "a symmetrically arranged symbolic diagram...
CULTURE / Books
Mar 17, 1999

Last glimpses of a vanishing people

THE VANISHING TRIBES OF BURMA, by Richard K. Diran. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 240 pp., $60. Coffee-table photo books are usually too expensive, space-consuming or indistinguishable in content from the art of the glossy postcard for most of us to consider buying. Every once in a while, however,...
JAPAN
Mar 17, 1999

Unions agree to record-low pay hikes

Labor and management at most of the nation's major metalworker unions reached agreements Wednesday marking a record-low average increase in monthly pay, effectively concluding this year's annual spring wage negotiations.
LIFE / Digital / CYBERIA
Mar 17, 1999

The doctor is in

Steve Chang has a fondness for viruses. It's not as ghoulish as it sounds; he's obsessed with the computer variety, not the human kind. Fortunately for him -- unfortunately for us -- there are a lot out there.
JAPAN
Mar 17, 1999

Nissan OKs 35% equity stake for Renault

Nissan Motor Co. on Wednesday appeared willing to have Renault SA of France buy an equity stake in the struggling automaker, saying specific conditions for the deal would hinge on further talks.
COMMUNITY / How-tos / GETTING THINGS DONE
Mar 17, 1999

But . . .

Recently I wrote about my visit to Myanmar (also known as Burma), of how the once-wealthy country is now slipping ever downward, its infrastructure in disrepair. Of Suu Kyi, whose house we were not allowed to see. Of how avidly the people watched her on TV. But mostly, of the beauty of the country and...
JAPAN
Mar 17, 1999

Ties to China unearthed from Yoshinogari ruins

KANZAKI, Saga Pref. -- Ever since their discovery was first announced in 1989, the Yoshinogari ruins, widely recognized in Japan as one of the oldest-known communities surrounded by moats, have been providing visitors information about ancient Japanese society.
LIFE / Travel
Mar 17, 1999

Worse than Vikings, English stag parties descend on Dublin

"Since tonight the wind is high The sea's white mane a fury I need not fear the hordes of hell Coursing the English Channel"
ENVIRONMENT
Mar 17, 1999

Become a friend of the Kurilsky Reserve

"It isn't in Japan, so why should I care?" is the reaction of some Japanese to the issue of conservation in the Northern Territories. Yet there are plenty of good reasons why it is in Japan's interest to take a leadership role in protecting wildlife on the islands:
JAPAN
Mar 17, 1999

Events set to mark 400th anniversary of Dutch ties

NAGASAKI -- 2000 marks the 400th anniversary of ties between Japan and the Netherlands, and various events are slated for the year to fete the shared history.
JAPAN
Mar 17, 1999

Amuro's mother slain; brother-in-law suspected

NAHA, Okinawa Pref. -- The mother of pop singer Namie Amuro was slain Wednesday morning on an Okinawa road in what police suspect may have been a murder- suicide involving the younger brother of her widowed husband.
COMMENTARY
Mar 17, 1999

What real bank reform means

Japan seems to like the new and shiny. Tack the word "shin" (new) onto the name of a product -- anything from a detergent to a political party -- and automatically you gain an edge over the opposition.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Mar 17, 1999

When international relations get all steamed up

When asked what part of Japan they would most like to take back home, many foreigners respond by saying, "a Japanese bathtub."
ENVIRONMENT
Mar 17, 1999

Disputed territory is a paradise in peril

Any Japanese schoolchild can wax eloquent about the Hoppo Ryodo or "Northern Territories," the tiny islands Japan has demanded back from Russia since World War II. And with Japan keen to resolve its border dispute with Russia and wrap up a peace treaty by the end of next year, the issue looks likely...
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 17, 1999

Exxon Valdez damage lingers, 10 years on

Ten years ago, March 24, 1989, the oil tanker Exxon Valdez ran aground on Bligh Reef south of Valdez, Alaska, precipitating the largest oil spill in North American history and forever altering the image of Prince William Sound as a largely untouched ecosystem.
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Mar 17, 1999

'Managing' marine mammals to death

Part two of two parts
JAPAN
Mar 16, 1999

Fatal IV drip spurs malpractice probe in Hiroo

A nurse at a Tokyo municipal hospital accidentally injected disinfectant into the intravenous drip of a patient instead of a substance meant to prevent blood clotting, killing the woman in February, police said Tuesday.
EDITORIALS
Mar 16, 1999

A good day for NATO

After the Cold War came to an end in 1989, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization expanded much faster than many people expected it to. Barely a decade on, Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic last week formally joined the 16-member alliance. Adding significance to the event is the fact that all three...
JAPAN
Mar 16, 1999

Information ethics panel finds Internet security poor

KYOTO -- Privacy and security issues on the Internet raise complex ethical as well as technical problems, and it's a mistake to assume the Internet is an anonymous form of communication.
JAPAN
Mar 16, 1999

DoCoMo phones to run on Java

NTT Mobile Communications Network has agreed to use Sun Microsystems' Java programming language in its new i-mode cellular phones, officials of the two firms announced Tuesday.
JAPAN
Mar 16, 1999

Revenues up in smoke, Minato mulls tobacco tax

Struggling under a heavy burden of debts, Tokyo's Minato Ward is considering the nation's first proposal to levy a local tax on tobacco vending machines, sources said Tuesday.
JAPAN
Mar 16, 1999

Kishi backs cut in overnight call rate

Satoru Kishi, chairman of the Federation of Bankers Associations of Japan, defended a recent decision by major banks to slash the interest rate for demand deposits from 1 percent to 0.05 percent per annum.
CULTURE / Music / FUZZY LOGIC
Mar 16, 1999

Sounds to soothe the savaged beast

Never drink a bottle of tequila with champagne chasers and then try to demonstrate your gymnastic prowess, I advise, lying here in my hospital bed.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Mar 16, 1999

XTC colors songs with earthy palette

Since they don't tour or make videos, XTC gives interviews. Lots of them. Colin Moulding, the group's soft-spoken bassist reckons he and his partner, guitarist Andy Partridge, have done something like a million since they began promoting their new album, "Apple Venus, Vol. 1," last fall.
JAPAN
Mar 16, 1999

Japan to aid small Russian enterprises

Trade chief Kaoru Yosano told visiting Russian first deputy prime minister Yuri Maslyukov on Tuesday that Tokyo is ready to expand support of Russian small and medium-size enterprises.
JAPAN
Mar 16, 1999

Deterioration appears to be at halt: BOJ

The Bank of Japan revised its assessment of the economy slightly upward in its monthly report released Tuesday, saying things appear "to have stopped deteriorating."
JAPAN
Mar 16, 1999

Slash corporate levies, raise sales tax, think tank urges

The government should scrap the 5.4 percent residential tax for businesses and halve the 9.9 percent local corporate tax to reinvigorate business activity, a private think tank proposed Tuesday.
JAPAN
Mar 16, 1999

JAL plans executive echelon makeover

Japan Airlines will reduce the number of board members and adopt an "executive officer" system as part of its three-year business plan, JAL President Isao Kaneko announced Tuesday.

Longform

A sinkhole in Yashio, which emerged in January, was triggered by a ruptured, aging sewer pipe. Authorities worry that similar sections of infrastructure across the country are also at risk of corrosion.
That sinking feeling: Japan’s aging sewers are an infrastructure time bomb